Well, it was inevitable, I am now officially part of the 30-something club. So far, no complaints! The past 2 weeks have been thoroughly enjoyable, spending our time at Walt Disney World in sunny Florida. OK, so maybe the heat and the humidity was a bit too much for my comfort, but boy did we have fun!!!

Really, I can’t recommend this place highly enough. So it is a bit cheesy, all a bit fake, claiming to be the happiest place on earth, … but it works, you just can’t help but be happy when you’re there. Disney manages to suppress the cynic and sarcast in me and bring out a more fluffier side and somehow I let them get away with it 😉

We went to Disney World 2 years ago for Niels’ 30th birthday too, but this time we stayed at Disney hotel so we’d have the Disney magic 24/7. We stayed at the Port Orleans Riverside, which had a theme of the Mississippi-bayou area of the Old South, on one side there are plantation-style mansions (think Gone with the Wind), the other side is a bit more quaint with smaller rustic, weathered-wood buildings with tin roofs. The whole resort is immaculately maintained, luscious gardening, it is simply stunning. Ideal for a romantic evening walk (if you can still manage to move your feet after a day in the parks!). There’s also plenty of wildlife around: ducks, squirrels, rabbits, cute tiny lizards and one freaky turtle. Really freaky turtle! It seems that a lizard and a turtle had a few too many margaritas one night and this is the result:

So we did spent just about all our time at the theme parks, just couldn’t get enough of it, especially the new ride they have the Hollywood Studios: Toy Story Mania. We went again and again and again and again and again and then a few more times. We managed to get quite good at it. Another fun thing was having breakfast and dinner with some of the Disney cast, although Niels does seem a bit spooked…

One of the best things at Disney are the fireworks, every single evening. I just love fireworks and the ones at Disney are without doubt the best I’ve ever seen (I’ll have to share those when I get round to editing our vacation video, this might take a while though, there are a few other videos that I have to finish first).

We did venture away from the theme parks and Orlando on Saturday 31 May. We took a trip just over an hour’s drive east from Orlando to Titusville. We soon noticed we weren’t the only people who decided to spend the afternoon there. We managed to find a nice parking spot and spent the next 2 hours in the blistering heat, it was horrible. But then at 5.02pm we watched a short 2 minute spectacle across the water. As soon as it was over we tried to head back to Orlando, however, several thousands others tried to do just that too and the result was a 3 hour traffic jam… Oh well, it was all worth it just to see this:

Yup, we went to see the space shuttle Discovery launch. There won’t be many more of these as they are retiring the space shuttle. We didn’t manage to escape Disney though as Buzz Lightyear was one the passengers!

So now we’re back, back behind my computer, ready to start editing again and dreaming of our next trip to Walt Disney World…